Our adventures, stories and pictures.

food

My flight made great time and we arrived half an hour early. With no bags and no sleep I was quick off the plane in hopes of getting in a quick nap before sightseeing. No luck though. After a short train ride to the city center I stopped in at the hotel and was told to come back at three. So, time for breakfast!

Amsterdam is small, pretty and very walkable. I had a short list of places I wanted to visit today, and all were in the southern “Museumplein” district at the south end of the city. Departing the hotel I made a beeline for a canal and had a lovely (and very quiet) morning stroll to my first stop: the Albert Cuypstraat Saturday market.

Markets were a huge part of our life when we lived in Paris. I miss shopping like this. The food is always so nicely laid out, and the vendors range from hawkers – who always have a deal on something – to afficiandos – who insist on knowing what you are cooking so they can find just the right piece. (Once, after telling a French butcher what I intended to do with a piece of meat, he outright refused to sell it to me.)

My first acquisition of the day was a giant Stroopwaffle – two thin waffles stuck together with syrup. This was a perfect snack to tide me over while I went searching for the real treasure, raw herring.

The “raw” part of raw herring is a bit of a misnomer. After being plucked from the North Sea, the herring is flash frozen (to prevent parasites) and then gutted, deboned, skinned and laid on salt for a bit. So less raw than sushi but more raw than ceviche. Traditionally it’s served with onions, sweet pickles and a tiny Dutch flag. I gather the idea is to use the toothpick to pick up the herring pieces, roll them in onion, and have a pickle chaser.
I lucked out and stepped just outside of the market in search of coffee and found a small shop that seemed to be to fish what a deli is to pigs. I’ll make a note here so I can come back next time I’m in town.

Mission accomplished, I left the market with a belly full of herring and wandered my way up and down the side streets of de pjip neighborhood until I found Museumplein.

Museumplein is home to several of the city’s art museums. I’d been here on my last trip to see Van Gough and taste genevar at the House of Bols. This time, I wanted to check out the Banksy exhibit at the Moco modern art museum. More on that later.
Following the museum adventure I grabbed a crummy cup of coffee from a locale cafe and got horribly lost en route to my final destination, and only repeat visit, the Heineken Experience.

Heineken is a local brewery that grew up on the outskirts of Amsterdam. The museum has a typical brewery tour experience to it, but with a few extras that come with being a global brand. I appreciate the sections dedicated to post-prohibition growth, and the bits explaining that the founder was a chemical engineer and one of the pioneers of beer science. Previously, brewing was thought of as more similar to baking or cooking. The best part though is the view from the roof top bar at the end of the tour.

After the tour I took the scenic route back home, passing locals relaxing in the sun all up and down the canals. I stopped in for a few snacks along the way, to keep my strength up. Amsterdam has no shortage of snacks, I suspect in part because of the local cannabis tourism. What came first, the munchies or the chorizo-manchego macarone?

On the way home I passed a Maoz Vegetarian, a falafel stop that we used to frequent when we lived in Paris. I figured I could go for some falafel, and so that made dinner for me. For dessert, Dutch apple pie. 🙂 followed by a very early bedtime and a glorious 11 hour slumber.

I’m heading to a week long meeting in Zurich, and it’s totally for work!! Really!

But with all of the work comes a bit of free time, and with that free time I will be eating my way through the best the Netherlands and Switzerland have to offer. What better way to see a city than with my stomach? 😉

My first stop wasn’t in Europe though. I have a short layover in Calgary where I’m enjoying exotic Canadian food.

That’s right. A teen burger, poutine and A&W Root Beer with sugar. None of which is available south of the border.

So good! But also, two days worth of calories in under ten minutes. Let the food coma commence in 3…2…zzzz….

When we lived in Sydney, one of Xavier’s favorite snacks was sushi. Specifically, cooked tuna hand rolls.

The hand roll part may be unfamiliar to folks; this is when the chef rolls a full maki style roll, and then cuts it in half instead of 6-10 pieces. It’s something I haven’t seen done often, but it’s a really convenient way to eat on the go.

The cooked tuna thing should be familiar, but maybe not in Sushi. By cooked tuna, I mean tinned tuna, usually mixed with a bit of mayo. For whatever reason this turns out to be something you can get only in Australia. I don’t know why – it’s delicious. You all are missing out.

Since emigrating, X keeps asking for sushi but all we can offer is kappa maki rolls instead. He’s let us know that America is letting him down, and I can’t say I blame him.

After some long and hard searching we have finally found a place that will fill the gap. There is a conveyor belt sushi restaurant, Blue C Sushi, in Kirkland that is a fun place to visit AND will custom roll cooked tuna hand rolls for X. They also have tasty cupcakes on the conveyor belt. 🍰

I’m hoping that if we take him once a fortnight that he’ll take “one way ticket to Sydney Harbour” off of his Christmas list.

A side effect of living in the burbs is that there’s very little to go and do writhing walking distance. In fact, the only things within a mile of my front door are a convenience store, a forest and a butcher.

I’ve been making friends over meat.

For the first year or so we were here the local butcher was a stereotypically friendly Turkish fella, who always threw in a little extra something when you chatted him up. He did the butchering and his wife cooked halal friendly side dishes… Typical dips and salads.

Something changed recently and my Turkish buddy was traded in for three bearded hipsters. I’m sad my buddy is gone. But the hipsters spit roast lamb once a week. Yummy, yummy lamb.

They stick a sign up on lamb day letting you know when to come and collect the carvings. If you’re smart, you call ahead. Our first night trying it out we waited an extra forty minutes for our cut, but it was worth it. When we told Xavier we were eating lamb, he asked if it was dead.

“Yes Xavier. The lamb is dead before it was cooked.”

“Aww… poor lamb.” He said while chewing on some shoulder.

The next week we took the above photo. Again to the tune of “aww, poor lamb” followed by “can we eat it for dinner?”

Last weekend we hosted Xavier’s second birthday party in the park near our house. It was an awesome day outside, even for the dead of winter, and we got super lucky with both weather and location.

For his second Birthday, Mom baked up a storm – there were owl cupcakes and special cookies shaped like buttons (both for the Giggle and Hoot theme), fairy bread, sandwiches, a sausage sizzle, and drinks galore. Unfortunately, most of his guests don’t have teeth yet, so a lot of the bits ended up being extra towards the end. On the up side, Sarah was heading out to meet up with some friends from the local uni afterwards, and as everyone knows, grad students will eat anything, so nothing went to waste.

In addition to spoiling him with food, he was also spoiled rotten in terms of gifts. But I think that’s ok – we don’t buy him too many things on account of having only a little bit of place to put stuff, and so he was about due for a ‘things’ and toy refresh. My favourite new addition was a great new duvet and duvet cover from our friends Tom and Alex. He’s been sleeping so much better now that he doesn’t get cold at night.

All in all he had a blast – he spent the afternoon playing in the sunshine with all of his friends, and running back for ‘cake breaks’ (or maybe just icing breaks) whenever he felt a bit peckish.

One of the fabulous Christmas gifts we received from our chef friends was the Foodies Guide to Sydney. This is not a restaurant guide; I have plenty of those. This is a guide to grocery stores, gardens, markets, bakeries, coffee roasters, and other purveyors of fine foods. Seeing as vacation = food, this was the perfect accessory for our summer excursions.

We consulted the guide on several of our excursions, and on the first day Nick was here we opted to take a short detour through the Central Coast on account of the recommendation of Distillery Botanica – a Gin distillery just outside the city bounds. How could we pass up the opportunity to visit a fully operational distillery, especially one who specialises in Gin, and native botanical liqueurs?

Distillery Botanica — recently rebranded from St Fiacre — is set in an old gardening centre. The proprietor, Philip Moore, has a long history as a gardener, and after developing an allergy to the liquor of the region (wine) he decided to retool a little and start making spirits. In particular, he wanted to highlight the flavours of the region, and he incorporates local herbs and such into his products whenever possible.

A lot of his inspiration in the production was taken from the London Dry Gin style, and the flavours in the Gin are very familiar. He showed us around the distillery, and took us into the back to show us his two copper stills. The big one had six separate filtration chambers, each one allowing him to refine the taste in his raw alcohol to be a little cleaner than the chamber before.

Copper Pot Still

After the tour, he took as back to the entrance for a tasting. We of course tried the gin (delicious!), but also some of his liqueurs. The raspberry liqueur was a clear crowd favourite. It tastes of purse raspberry with a nice balance of sweet and tart, and no hint of alcohol at all. His other, native flavours included things like Lemon Myrtle, Mountain Pepperberry, and Wild Lime. Each one was delicious as a digestif; but perhaps a little too sweet for my palate under normal circumstances. My favourites were all flavours that had a nice tart or spice to balance the sugar.

After the tasting (and buying) we took a quick trip around the gardens to stretch our legs. Philip told us that the entire area had been lovingly brought back to life using a delicate garden tool (a back hoe) about two years prior. You’d hardly know to look at it though. The path from the car park had a wide variety of flowering plants, and was teeming with small bugs and animals.

A butterfly resting on some white flowers near the entrance of the garden.Lavender lines the interior courtyard.

This is another one of those lists that got stuck in my inbox for a while.

When we were living in Paris, we had a disproportionately large number of Vegetarians visit. We were always happy to see our friends, but it was sometimes a little tricky for them to find good eats. The French are not known to have a strong culture of vegetarianism (some of the things I’ve seen them do to vegetables has been downright shocking).

If you’re pescatarian, or at least ovo-lacto, you’ll always be able to find an option. If you find your diet a little more restrictive, then perhaps some of these options might help.

Crepes and Falafal were a staple for our veg friends. For Falafal, either L’as du falafal (a tourist staple) in the Marais, or Maoz (our preference) near St Germain. Crepes are pretty common everywhere, but my favourite place is a street facing vendor near Opera Bastille, on the corner of Rue de la Roquette called Le Bastille.

For Chinese, I’d recommend Tien Hiang. I think that it’s a Buddhist restaurant; they do tasty faux-meat if you’re traveling with a carnivore. There are two locations — the one at 14 Rue Bichat, 75010 is a tad sketchy. I’d go to the one at 170 Rue Du Faubourg, Saint Denis instead.

I’ve heard great things about Le Grenier de Notre Dame from a few different folk. They were one of the earliest Vegetarian / Macrobiotic restaurants in Paris, and have a good range of food.

There’s an organic pizza place on at #8 Rue Cadet, called Green Pizz, that has really good pizza, and plenty of veg options.

La Paradise du Fruit is a chain that should be pretty easy to find. They are a themed restaurant, and everything must contain a fruit of some kind. This lends itself well to vegetarian offerings. In addition to the tasty food, they have killer ice cream sundaes. Feel free to bring your carnivores; this is the only place on the list that has hunk-of-meat options.

And finally, the best way to eat Vegetarian in Paris: The markets! We spent a lot of nights enjoying delicious produce from the local markets. There’s never a shortage of tasty cheese, baguette, fruit, pistachios and wine.

There are more options on Happy Cow. These are just the ones that I can personally recommend.